The Cosmological Argument

The idea that there is a first cause behind the existence of the universe

The classical argument

Things come into existence because something has caused them to happen

Things are caused to exist but they do not have to exist There is a chain of causes going back to the beginning of time Time began with the creation of the universe There must have been a first cause, which brought the universe

into existence The first cause must have necessary existence to cause the

contingent universe God has necessary existence Therefore God is the first cause of the contingent universe’s

existence

Being

Necessary being Something that has to exist The non-existence of a necessary being would

be a contradiction Contingent being

Something that comes into and will go out of existence

Something that need not be

Thomas Aquinas

Major work – Summa Theologica c1273 Five ways to prove the existence of god

Unmoved mover Unmoved causer Possibility and necessity Goodness, Truth and Nobility Teleological

The First Way

Based on the idea of motion or change An object only moves when an external force

is applied Things are changed through a chain of

movements These movements or changes cannot go

back to infinity Therefore there must be a Prime Mover That prime mover must be God

The Second Way

There are a series of causes Nothing can cause itself Therefore there must have been a first cause That fisrt cause is God

The Third Way

We can observe that everything is contingent If time is infinite there must have been a point

at which nothing existed If everything is contingent then nothing would

exist as something cannot come from nothing Therefore there must have been a necessary

being that brought about the contingent things

That necessary being is God

Leibniz (1646 – 1716)

Accepted cosmological argument Said there has to be ‘sufficient reason’

Imagine an eternal book, copies being made from earlier books.

We can explain the present book as a copy of the previous book

But we do not get to a full reason for the book Likewise an eternal world would not present

sufficient reason for it’s existence Leibniz therefore rejected an infinite universe

and concluded that God was the first cause

David Hume (1711-1776)

All knowledge comes from sense experience We believe that we know more about the

universe than is warranted Human mistake is to allow imagination to

make connections between cause and effect What we observe are two separate events

occurring at separate times – it is habit if mind that makes the connection

David Hume (1711-1776)

Hume asks why we must assume a beginning – why not eternal?

Further he questions why a universe that does have a beginning has to have a cause

Ultimately this leads to questioning any need for a God.

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)

The idea of cause and effect relates to the world of sense experience

God is outside the world of sense experience We cannot apply the law of cause and effect

to something that is not a part of our sense experience

Therefore people cannot people cannot know God

Copleston and Russell

Radio debate 1947 Copleston supported the idea of sufficient

reason Russell argued against the idea of

contingency and necessitity Russell concluded that just because humans

have a mother it does not mean that the universe has to have one too.

Putting it altogether

Write bullet points that show how you would go about answering the following exam question:

a) Explain Aquinas’ version of the Cosmological argument. (33)

b) ‘I should say that the universe is just there and that’s all.’ Discuss (17)